Ronan woke up gasping.
His shirt was drenched. His back stuck to the sheets. Heart pounding like it had been running laps without him. Behind his eyes, something pulsed—sharp and hot, like claws dragging behind the bone.
Then—
"Easy, kid."
That gravelly voice. Tired, rough around the edges. His wolf.
"You're fine. I bit the bastard."
Ronan groaned, dragging a hand over his face. "What?"
"The leech. Slid in while you were sleeping. Tried to ride your spine like a parasite. Dumb thing."
"You… ate it?"
"Bit a chunk off. Just a sliver. Enough to make it squeal and slither back to whatever moldy hole it came from."
Ronan sat up, heart still trying to catch up with his body. "So it's gone?"
"Nope. Just pissed."
He should've been scared. Maybe he was. But somewhere under the fear was… relief. And even a flicker of pride.
They'd survived the night.
Somehow.
Later that afternoon, Calla looked better.
She didn't say it. But Ronan noticed.
Her face had color again. Not much, but enough to make her look less like a walking chalk outline. The deep shadows under her eyes had softened. Her hands weren't shaking.
They were in the quiet back corner of the campus library, two mismatched chairs, an old laptop between them, a stack of stolen printouts at their feet. Outside, the sky was threatening rain.
Calla stirred her coffee slowly, eyeing him over the rim.
"So… let me get this straight. You've got a wolf living in your head."
Ronan glanced at her. "Yeah. And he's kind of a dick."
"Say it again, sweetheart," the wolf muttered. "I dare you."
Calla didn't flinch. In fact, she cracked a smirk.
"Honestly? I'm not surprised."
Ronan blinked. "You're not?"
She shrugged. "Since orientation, you've been… different. Like you were always listening to something no one else could hear. And that night in the woods—you blacked out, bled, vanished—and showed up fine the next day like nothing happened."
He said nothing.
"I figured you had something in you," she added. "Just didn't guess it was a sarcastic wolf with anger issues."
"She's got good instincts. We should keep her," the wolf said.
Ronan rubbed his temples. "He says he likes you. Still won't protect you."
Calla raised an eyebrow. "How sweet."
They shared a look. Not the awkward kind. The kind where a hundred things didn't need to be said out loud anymore.
They used the breathing room to dig deeper.
Ronan didn't ask how she knew her way into staff servers. He didn't want to know. She tapped through encrypted folders like she was playing Minesweeper.
She paused on one labeled "Withdrawn Cases."
Inside: redacted incident reports, faded photos, and vague terms like "Behavioral Collapse," "Sudden Resignation," and "Disappearance Under Review." Some dated back to 1996.
But one folder stood out.
"Project: E. Lorne"
There was a photo of the professor. Younger. Cleaner cut. But definitely the same man teaching Comparative Biology this semester.
"He doesn't age," Calla said under her breath.
Ronan frowned. "He's been here this whole time."
"And this—" She clicked open a scanned document. "This is the same symbol we saw in the lab."
Some kind of ouroboros stitched inside a geometric diagram. Part alchemy. Part ritual. Part something else.
Before they could process it, a sound pulled them out of the moment.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
At the window.
They turned.
Across the quad, a man stood beneath the tree line. Black coat. Hood low over his face. Wind tugged at a crimson scarf wrapped around one wrist.
He didn't move.
Didn't wave.
Just watched.
By the time they got outside, he was gone.
But in the spot he'd been standing, a torn strip of paper fluttered in the grass. Ronan bent to pick it up.
Four words, handwritten.
"RUN DEEPER. BEFORE IT RUNS YOU."
No signature. No explanation.
But the wolf stirred instantly.
"That one's not normal," he growled. "Not human. Or at least, not only."
That night, Ronan stood beneath the trees behind the dorms. Quiet. Cold. The air felt heavier here. Like something was watching from deeper in the woods.
The wolf was quiet. Too quiet.
"You scared that thing off," Ronan said. "Why not protect Calla too?"
"Because you're mine."
"She's not. That's not how this works."
Ronan clenched his fists. "Then make it work."
Silence.
"You think this is a buddy cop show?" the wolf growled. "I exist because you cracked. You were broken enough to let something like me in. That's the deal. You break, I bite. She's not broken. She's on her own."
Ronan grit his teeth. "She's not a tool."
"She's not mine."
He let the silence fall again.
Then Calla's voice echoed in his head—I figured you had something in you—and something in his chest ached.
"We need more time," Ronan whispered. "So help me buy it. And I'll finish this."
The wolf paused.
"When the leech comes back," it said finally, "it won't crawl. It'll come with teeth. You better be ready to bleed."